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[Page 9]
and when we returned from fatigues it was often impossible to get even a few minutes sleep..
But we had one occupation of which we never tired. We would sit on the parados of the trench and watch our shells burst over Pozieres. Shells of all calibres were used. Shrapnel beautifully timed, huge H.E. shells and one shell in especial, a shell that burst with a sheet of flame towards the ground made the life in the German lines a perfect hell. Little did we think that in a few days we would be occupying that position under a similar bombardment from the enemy. (Hun)
We had been told that the attack was to take place on Friday, the 20th July, but we were afterwards informed that if had been postponed. In the meantime we were issued with sandbags which were sown under the shoulder-straps of the tunic, bombs which were fused, an extra hundred rounds of ammunition and 48 hours iron rations. Our packs were stacked in a dug-out in this trench which we had come to call Casualty Corner and we were all ready for the last phase. We were beginning to wish that the hour for attack would come. Waiting plays on a man's nerves. Too much time to think is bad for a hot-blooded action.
On Saturday night we went out on fatigue. This night's work appealed to us at the time as the height of impudence. We crossed the front line and constructed a communication sap two-thirds of the distance to the enemy line. The shelling was heavy though not intense but the shells landed either in front or behind us. No man's land was the safest spot as far as shell-fire was concerned. We completed our task and arrived back at supports about 1am. We were advised to get as much sleep as possible for it was problematic whether we would be able to get any more for the next three or four days. We slept well under the circumstances but were early awake.
Sunday 22nd
Sunday the 22nd July was a beautiful summer's day. The sun shone and if it had been under different conditions one would have been filled with the "Joie de Vie" but as it was one's mind was fixed on the immediate future. What did the morrow hold for us? – would protrude itself on our mind. Would we be alive and able to enjoy the sun on the morrow?- Would we be in hospital minus limbs, or suffering from wounds? These thoughts would persist but they were not subjects of conversations. Each man knew that his comrade had such thoughts but each man knew that he was expected to talk and behave as though such a thought had never come within the sphere of his consciousness. I suppose we all think deeply of what may be, when we are to make an attack, but on the other hand we all feel bound to cover such thoughts with a cloak, and the average conversation carried on is merely a matter of jests. Stories are told and then as the whistle blows one might casually remark-"Well so long old chap" and away we go.
Early on Sunday morning rolls were made with all the information required, next of kin, etc.- This again brought home new thoughts of the possibilities of the morrow, but though each new act, that showed more clearly the character of the work that lay ahead, was given its true significance by the boys, and though every hour brought more certainly before us the uncertainty of the future, yet this new realisation of the instability of existence once over the top did not lessen our desire to make good or shake our knowledge of the fact that absolute success would be ours. All it conveyed was this:- on the morrow when the success had been attained, some of us would not be there. It did not affect our will to do or die. It did not detract one iota from the dash of the charge. It simply gave us knowledge and new thoughts,- that was all.
Sunday was spent in fatigue work. Parties were passing up and down all day from Gordon's Dump to the front line. Water parties,